174

711.94/1581

Memorandum by the Secretary of State Regarding a
Conversation With The British Ambassador (Lothian) and the Australian Minister (Casey)

[Extracts]

[WASHINGTON,] June 28, 1940.

I said that this country has been progressively bringing economic pressure to bear on Japan
since last summer, now a year, and I enumerated the different steps and
methods, which are familiar to all, and added that our fleet is now somewhere
in the Pacific near Hawaii. I said that we have and are doing everything
possible short of a serious

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risk of actual military hostilities to keep the Japanese situation stabilized, and that this course
during the past year is the best evidence of our intentions and activities in
the future.

As to . . . a joint effort to bring about peace between Japan and China, I explained . . .
that this Government would only make two points in that connection, one, the
principles underlying the Japanese new order in eastern Asia policy as it is
being practiced would need negativing or at least serious modifying, and,
second, that no properties or interests of China be offered to Japan by Great
Britain or the United States, or, in other words, that we do not make peace
with Japan at the expense of China nor at the expense of the principles which
were contained in my statement to Japan and 55 other Governments in July,
1937, when Japan moved into China for the purpose of its conquest.